The incredibly tender Bulgarian banitsa pie is known all over the world: the traditional recipe is made from stretched phyllo dough, which resembles the thinnest sheets of parchment. Baked goods are served at various celebrations. At the same time, banitsa is good for breakfast, but it can be served at any time of the day. It has a crispy crust and a tender soft filling. Cottage cheese and cottage cheese are most often used to prepare the filling. But in theory you can make a pie with minced meat and various vegetables. If you don’t like working with dough, then banitsa can be made from thin Armenian lavash. Of course, such a pie cannot be called traditional, but it will turn out no less tasty!
In Mediterranean cuisine, phyllo dough is the most popular. It allows you to obtain aromatic baked goods that are fragile and airy. Experienced chefs say that it is impossible to prepare it at home. But if you are confident in your abilities, you can try kneading the dough yourself. For those who like simpler options, we suggest purchasing ready-made phyllo or puff pastry without yeast.
Basics
As we wrote in the article about the Bulgarian banitsa, there are many types of such baked goods, but they have one thing in common - dough. Thin, parchment-like sheets of phyllo dough are sold in supermarkets in Bulgaria under the name “Tocheni kori” and are quite inexpensive. Theoretically, you can make filo dough yourself - then the banitsa will have a special “homemade” taste. But, frankly speaking, there is a lot of fuss with this. And you will need flour with a high gluten content, and a table for stretching with a linen tablecloth, and time, and - most importantly - experience! In general, it's easier to buy.
In Bulgaria, phyllo dough is called “tocheni kori.” The dough sheets are very thin, so they are folded into small piles and coated with butter. It is convenient to use a silicone brush for this. While we are preparing the stacks, it is better to cover the remaining sheets with something so that they do not dry out. Some recipes do without basting. The choice of fillings is huge; you can prepare banitsa with both traditional Bulgarian cheese and lesser-known fillings. Greens, meat, fish, eggs, cottage cheese, grated apples, vegetables - there are a lot of options. It is clear that the more filling, the better, but you should not be too zealous, otherwise the thin cakes will tear and the filling will leak out. You need to lay out juicy toppings, such as grated pumpkin or apple, especially sparingly.
“Nalyozna banitsa” is the simplest option, the dough is simply layered with filling. The easiest way to prepare is “nanozhena banitsa”. Simply place buttered stacks of dough into the pan, sprinkling them with filling. The last layer is the dough. To make the banitsa with siren juicy, it is sometimes cut into portioned squares directly in the mold and filled with liquid mixed with beaten eggs. Usually they use sour milk, fresh milk, and sparkling water. Kiselo mlyako can be replaced with natural yogurt and low-fat sour cream. Vita banitsa is more difficult to prepare - you don’t just need to put sheets of dough in a mold, but first make a roll out of them, and then lay it out in the form of a spiral. The finished pie is brushed with yolk and a small amount of butter, and then sent to the oven. If you wish, you can fold the sheets into squares, triangles, or something else - it will be delicious in any case.
Preparing the filling
How is Bulgarian banitsa prepared? The recipe with photo shows that preparing a snack may involve the use of different products. We decided to use homemade cheese as a filling. But before using this product, it should be carefully processed.
Place raw chicken eggs in a small bowl and then lightly beat with a fork until smooth. Then add a pinch of table soda to drinking natural yogurt and mix well. As for the feta cheese, place it in a deep plate and mash it a little with a fork. Finally, all ingredients are combined and thoroughly mixed.
Lazy banitsa
Homemade Bulgarian banitsa with sirene Take a package of “tocheni kori”, 4-5 eggs for filling, one egg for greasing, 350-400 g of feta cheese, 250 ml of sparkling water, 300 ml of kiselo mlyako, 1 coffee spoon of baking powder, a little salt and 125 g butter (you can do less if, like us, you don’t like it too fatty). For the filling, beat the eggs well, add sour cream, a little salt and baking powder. Mix the mixture well and add the crushed feta cheese (siren). In a buttered pan, place three sheets of dough, the filling (with pieces of butter added to it), 2 layers of dough, the filling with butter... there should be two sheets of dough on top. If there is any filling left, pour it onto the edges of the pie. We cut the banitsa directly in the mold into portioned pieces. Now all that remains is to grease the banitsa with egg; for this it is convenient to use the same silicone brush. Now pour a glass of sparkling water over the pie and put it in the oven, preheated to 230 degrees, and immediately reduce the temperature to 180 degrees. The pie is baked for 35-40 minutes. After removing it from the oven, sprinkle the top crust with cold water and cover the banitsa with a towel for 5-10 minutes. After this, you can cut and serve the pie; it is best to eat it warm.
Banitsa recipe with photos or preparing a traditional Bulgarian dish
Banitsa is a traditional dish of Bulgarian cuisine.
A festive feast is unthinkable without it. At a holiday with the participation of a skillful Bulgarian hostess, you will always taste banitsa.
The banitsa itself is an unleavened pie. Essentially, it is a thin pita bread with filling inside. Moreover, the filling may be different. Banitsa can be made with feta cheese , Bulgarian yogurt (which is “sour mlyak” in Bulgarian), meat, cottage cheese ( lazy banitsa ) or egg.
Our first acquaintance with Banitsa occurred as soon as we got off the train in the city of Ruse. We did not have Bulgarian currency at that time, and one of the passengers of the Moscow-Sofia train on which we were traveling kindly agreed to exchange rubles for levs for us.
Mlečná banica (milk banica)
And this is a kind of dessert. In Bulgaria, things are not very good with sweet dishes, at least we don’t like the desserts here. One of the most popular options in Bulgarian cafes is cream caramel. Anyone who has tried Spanish flan knows that it is essentially a sweet omelette. So, milky banitsa is a banitsa filled with such an omelet. But due to the cake layers, the egg taste is not too pronounced, so overall it’s a pretty good dessert.
When the banitsa is browned, you can take it out of the oven. Take 400 g of tocheni kori (kori for banitsa), 150 g of butter, a liter of milk, 250 g of sugar, 5 eggs, vanilla sugar.
The pie is prepared a little differently than usual. First you need to bring the milk and sugar to a boil, then cool and mix with beaten eggs and vanilla. If desired, you can add zest, cinnamon, coconut or flavoring. The dough sheets are greased with oil, rolled into a roll and cut into pieces. These pieces, vaguely reminiscent of roses (that’s why the banitsa is sometimes called “on the roses”), are placed vertically in the mold, with a small piece of butter placed in the middle of each. After this, the banitsa is baked until lightly browned in the oven at a temperature of 180-200 degrees. Let this semi-finished product cool slightly and fill it with the strained egg-milk mixture. After this, we bake the banitsa so that the filling is also browned. Serve chilled. You may also be interested in our other articles: Pearls of Bulgarian cuisine - baked peppers, “chushka burek”, “pilneni chushki” Bulgarian dish drob sarma: a hybrid of pilaf and casserole Food in Bulgaria: questions and answers Do you like the article? Share with your friends by clicking on the social media buttons! Thank you!
General information
Before I tell you how the Bulgarian banitsa pie is prepared, it is worth telling you what Bulgarian folk cuisine is in general.
Bulgarian cuisine is the national pride of the country. It is widespread not only in the mentioned state, but also in other territories of South-Eastern Europe. It should be especially noted that it is very similar to Greek, Romanian and Turkish cuisines. This fact is explained by the fact that both Bulgaria and the named states are located next door.
It must also be said that Italy, Armenia, Hungary and the Mediterranean had a great influence on this layer of culture.
Delicate curd Bulgarian pastries: recipes
Banitsa can be either fresh or salty (for example, with feta cheese), or sweet. To prepare the latter version of the dish, country cottage cheese with sugar is often used. But first things first.
What ingredients are needed to make Bulgarian banitsa pie with cottage cheese at home? For such a tasty and delicate product we will need the following components:
- puff pastry without yeast - 2 standard packages;
- high-fat country cottage cheese – about 200 g;
- fine white sugar – approximately 100 g;
- vegetable oil without a characteristic aroma (that is, refined) - 3 dessert spoons;
- large country egg – 1 pc.
Nutritional and energy value:
| Ready meals | |||
| kcal 4742.9 kcal | proteins 230.5 g | fat 349 g | carbohydrates 158.7 g |
| Portions | |||
| kcal 237.1 kcal | proteins 11.5 g | fat 17.5 g | carbohydrates 7.9 g |
| 100 g dish | |||
| kcal 282.3 kcal | proteins 13.7 g | fat 20.8 g | carbohydrates 9.4 g |
Recipe 1, step by step: phyllo dough banitsa
So, our recipe for banitsa involves the use of store-bought phyllo dough. It is sold in large supermarkets, where there are refrigerators with dumplings, frozen vegetables and ice cream. We rarely paid attention to any other dough except for puff pastry or puff pastry pizza. It is enough just to carefully examine the assortment. The packaging contains all the necessary information about defrosting and heat treatment. Don't invent problems, do as it is written. The stretch-dried dough is easily divided into separate transparent sheets.
Preparing the filling is extremely simple. Crumble or grate the cheese into a small bowl, first removing it from the brine. By the way, you can take more cheese if you want. Add a quarter cup of natural sour milk to the bowl. It is better not to use kefir or other fermented milk products. As a last resort, buy a liter of regular whole milk and let it sour. Stir and knead the filling until smooth. The cheese is salty, so there is no need to add salt to the filling.
Unroll the defrosted phyllo dough, being careful not to damage it. Prepare a ceramic or glass baking dish. As a rule, the size of the unfolded dough does not coincide with the dimensions of the form, therefore a multi-layer pack of dough must be “cut” with kitchen scissors. If there are narrow or shapeless pieces left, they can be used in the inner layers, but this will not make it any worse. We need to decide how many layers of filling we will get in the baked goods - I ended up with two layers of filling and three layers of dough.
Grease the mold with a small amount of butter and place a third of the dough on the bottom without greasing the layers. Place half of the prepared mixture of feta cheese and sour milk on the dough. The filling is not liquid, rather it is pasty. Using a spoon or spatula, smooth the filling into a layer of uniform thickness - over the entire area of the dough, from side to side of the mold.
Place another third of the dough on top of the filling - you can use one that consists of scraps and shapeless pieces. By the way, the quality of laying and geometric accuracy of the layers does not matter. The layers of dough may look a little “sloppy”. When the baking is ready, it will be completely unnoticeable. Lay out the rest of the filling, smooth it out and cover with all the dough that is left. It is very easy to compact the dough and filling with your palms, leveling the surface.
Release the eggs into a bowl or bowl, add all the sour milk that is left - a quarter cup. Beat the mixture with a fork and set aside for now. You can melt the butter in the microwave. This is the preparation of two fillings.
Before baking, the banitsa must be cut so that the filling disperses between the layers of dough. To cut the dough you need a small, very sharp knife. Vertically, literally with the very tip of the knife, cut all layers of dough. You will get squares with a side of 4-5 cm. The layers are quite loose, so when cutting you need to hold the dough with your fingers.
Pour melted butter over the cut banitsa. It is important that the entire surface of the dough is covered in a film of butter - otherwise it will dry out and crack during baking, and the melted butter will flow into all the cuts as much as possible. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees and place the mold in it.
After 20-25 minutes, remove the pan from the oven. Pour a quarter glass of water into the eggs mixed with sour milk and shake the mixture. Pour the egg mixture over the banitsa and additionally run a knife along all the cuts and along the side. Place the form back in the oven.
“Byrza hrana” or fast food in Bulgarian
You can buy ready-made banitsa in a banitsa shop. This is the name of a street “cafe” specializing in baking and selling fresh (and sometimes not so fresh) banitsa. Many locals eat banitsa for breakfast with sour milk, ayran or boza. As a rule, such baked goods taste much worse than homemade ones, but they are fantastically cheap - 1-2 leva. In banicharnitsa, they mainly sell rectangular banitsa (“superimposed”), since it is easier to prepare and more convenient to divide into portions.
Early in the morning, a small line of local residents (mostly men) line up at the banitsa, who take fresh banitsa with them to work, as breakfast or lunch. By mid-day, the bathhouses are usually already closed. What prevents them from baking banitsa from morning to evening is a mystery.
As noted above, the cost of baking in banicharnitsa is record low, and therefore the manufacturer is forced to save on everything, including cleanliness. Be prepared for the fact that there are no disposable gloves; the seller can take the banitsa with the same hand with which he takes payment. Individual packaging of the banitsa is a piece of thick paper and sometimes a plastic bag.
“Tocheni kori” ready-made dough for banitsa
Fortunately for aesthetes, banitsa can also be bought in a cafe at a gas station (Shell, Gazprom, Lukoil, OMV), where it costs a little more and is slightly different in shape, but the level of cleanliness and service is higher. In conclusion, it is worth noting that banitsa is a very high-calorie and difficult-to-digest food, since it contains a lot of dough; it is better to eat it with fresh vegetables. Banitsa can also be filled with apples, thawed or fresh berries, herbs and mushrooms.
Where does this name come from?
Some believe that the name comes from the ancient Slavic word “gѫbnti” meaning “to bend, fold” (gbanitsa –› banitsa). In Bulgarian, the word “banitsa” symbolizes severe bruising. For example, a teacher can make a remark to a student about the state of his notebook, comparing it with a banitsa. The same can be said about a car crushed in an accident. According to another version, “bannitsa” is a measure of bread in Rus', 8 bannitsa is one kilogram (Brockhaus-Efron encyclopedic dictionary, 1890).
Similar varieties of pastries are found in neighboring countries: spinach pie spinakopita (σπανακόπιτα) in Greece, gibanica in Serbia, börek in Turkish cuisine (filled with sheep's cheese), bureka in Israel, bougatsa in Macedonia, achma in Georgia. All these baking options are united by filo puff pastry, prepared in a similar way.
Formation process
How is banitsa (Bulgarian dish) formed? After the dough has been thawed and the filling has been processed, begin making the semi-finished product. To do this, take a heat-resistant form and lightly coat it with vegetable oil. Then a rolled out layer of dough is placed on the sheet, onto which a little filling is placed. Having leveled the cheese with a spoon, it is covered with the base again, the filling is laid out, etc.
The described steps should be carried out until all products are in a heat-resistant form. Moreover, the final layer must be the base. The top is again greased with vegetable or butter. This is necessary so that the Bulgarian pie turns out ruddy and acquires a golden crust.
How to form correctly?
Bulgarian puff pastry banitsa is very easy to form. To begin with, the rolled out rectangular layers are greased with a small amount of refined oil, and then a little sweet curd mass is added. In this case, the filling is distributed evenly over the entire sheet, not reaching 2 centimeters to the edges. After this, the dough with cottage cheese is rolled into a roll, which, in turn, is twisted in a spiral and placed in a heat-resistant form.
Having formed all the products in a similar way, they are also placed in a bowl. In this case, you should end up with a pie in the shape of a kind of snail shell.
